Photograph by: Adrian Wyld
, THE CANADIAN PRESS

Trudeau, who declared that the 32 Liberal Senators will no longer sit in his caucus and will become independents, was responding to public disgust with scandals that have involved three Conservative appointees and one ex-Liberal.

"The Senate is broken and needs to be fixed," Trudeau said before a meeting with his caucus, now made up of just his 36 MPs.

Critics accused him of distancing himself from the scandal-plagued Senate out of fear that Auditor General Michael Ferguson's audit will unearth new wrongdoings involving Liberal Senators.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper mocked Trudeau's gambit, noting that most of the ousted senators — with the exception of B.C.'s Larry Campbell — insisted Wednesday they'd continue to operate in the upper chamber as Liberal supporters.

Vancouver's Roger Gibbins, a political scientist and former head of the Canada West Foundation, also questioned Trudeau's move.

"We still have senators with strong Liberal backgrounds, who self-identify as Liberals, who were appointed by a Liberal PM, and who have acted all their lives as Liberals. Now, with a wave of the wand and a sprinkling of pixie dust they become independents? Would anyone treat Harper seriously if he did the same?" Gibbins asked.

"What it does do, I guess, is spare Trudeau from any responsibility for any Liberal senators caught up in the expense scandal net."

David Moscrop, a PhD candidate in political science at the University of B.C. who studies democratic citizenship, said too much depends on how senators react. "In the short term I can't imagine such a bold behavioural shift coming about, though. Not while the old guard remains in place and the Conservative senators remain thoroughly partisan. Everyone needs to play by the same rules for Mr. Trudeau's approach to be effective."

But some analysts said the move could be one of the few positive, if limited, changes after many decades of fruitless discussions about the Senate's future.

Senators and especially MPs have been long viewed as being "trained seals" who follow the marching orders of party leaders' offices rather than the wishes of ordinary Canadians.

Now the ex-Liberal senators, and potentially a majority of the Senate if the Conservatives ever follow suit, could be better able to fulfil the upper chamber's constitutional mandate to defend regional interests.

"Anything that raises the profile of the Senate as a semi-independent body would be regarded by the outlying provinces as a good thing," said Simon Fraser University political scientist Campbell Sharman, who in 2004 was associate research director for the B.C. Citizens' Assembly on Electoral Reform.

An Australian, he compared B.C. to Western Australia, which has led opposition to reforms that would water down the clout of that country's powerful elected upper chamber.

The University of Victoria's Norman Ruff said the federal cabinet, operating largely in secrecy, and provincial premiers have over many decades assumed the role of defending regional interests. "The Senate was designed to fulfil that role but hasn't been doing it because of the partisan appointments."

Analysts cautioned the public not to assume the Senate will change radically. Harper refused to follow Trudeau's lead Wednesday, and a significant majority of his 57 Conservatives in the 105-seat upper chamber don't hit the mandatory retirement age of 75 until well after 2020.

Critics also noted that many expelled senators said Wednesday they plan to remain party supporters and will continue to defend the party's interests and values in the Senate — and in future elections. Campbell was one of Trudeau's harshest critics.

"I think it's a brave move on the part of Justin. I don't know that it's a smart move," the former Vancouver mayor told The Vancouver Sun.

Campbell, who didn't attend a meeting Trudeau held with senators Wednesday morning, said Trudeau should have shown the courtesy of consulting with senators first.

He also questioned how the Senate will function in terms of its role in scrutinizing government legislation. He asked, for instance, who will sit on committees and who will be named critics for which bills.

"If someone comes up and asks me to be a critic on a bill I'm going to say, 'forget it.' Campbell, who said he's confident Ferguson's audit of his expenses won't show any discrepancies, acknowledged that Trudeau's decision to distance himself from the Senate may be a smart political move. And he said the Senate could become more effective and legitimate if the 105-seat chamber gradually became more independent.

"It could be a smart political move from the point of view of Liberals distancing themselves from the Senate, and from the point of view of maybe moving forward on Senate reform. "

B.C.'s only other Liberal appointee, Mobina Jaffer, took a far different stance. "I feel liberated. . . . I'm very excited," she told The Sun. "For a long time this has been necessary. . . . It means now I can do what I think is correct (and) look after the interests of British Columbians." Asked why she wasn't always able to do that as a Liberal caucus member, she replied: "Sometimes you listen to your House of Commons colleagues as to how politically it would be better to do A or B."

Campbell was appointed to the Senate in 2005 by Paul Martin. Jaffer, a lawyer who twice failed to win a House of Commons seat, was named to the upper chamber by Jean Chretien in 2001. B.C. has three Harper appointees who took their Senate seats in early 2009 — ex-Olympian Nancy Greene Raine, former schoolteacher and failed Tory candidate Yonah Martin, and former MLA and provincial cabinet minister Richard Neufeld.

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